Kate Middleton Was Adorably Nervous When the Queen Visited Her “Back to Nature” Garden

(Image credit: Geoff Pugh / WPA Pool for Getty Images)

published 22 May 2022

The Chelsea Flower Show is this week, and who can forget when Kate Middleton designed a garden for the show in 2019? Yet apparently, behind the scenes, the Duchess of Cambridge was adorably nervous as she waited for grandmother-in-law the Queen to arrive at the show to see her creation—even taking part in a last-minute cleanup and stuffing twigs into her handbag to make sure everything was perfect for Her Majesty.

Kate’s “Back to Nature” garden included a hand-built treehouse and a rope swing and was inspired by Kate’s childhood. It even touchingly featured forget-me-nots, the late Princess Diana’s favorite flower. When the Queen visited the show, Kate proudly showed her around.

“But before Her Majesty arrived, a seemingly nervous Kate was eager to impress and scurried around the garden tidying up,” the Mirror reports. “And according to onlookers, she was even spotted stuffing loose twigs and leaves into her designer handbag—all to make sure everything was looking perfect.”

Fortunately, and not surprisingly, the Queen seemed to like Kate’s garden. Her Majesty is hoping to attend the Chelsea Flower Show this week alongside other royals, including granddaughter Princess Beatrice, the Mirror reports. Among the displays will be The Queen’s Platinum Jubilee Garden, “which will feature laser-cut steel silhouettes of the monarch, surrounded by 70 planted terracotta pots, representing each year of her reign,” the Mirror writes.

The Queen has attended the Chelsea Flower Show more than 50 times over the course of her 70-year reign.

Rachel Burchfield is a writer, editor, and podcaster whose primary interests are fashion and beauty, society and culture, and, most especially, the British Royal Family and other royal families around the world. She serves as Marie Claire’s Senior Celebrity and Royals Editor and has also contributed to publications like Allure, Cosmopolitan, Elle, Glamour, Harper’s Bazaar, InStyle, People, Vanity Fair, Vogue, and W, among others. Before taking on her current role with Marie Claire, Rachel served as its Weekend Editor and later Royals Editor. She is the cohost of Podcast Royal, a show that was named a top five royal podcast by The New York Times. A voracious reader and lover of books, Rachel also hosts I’d Rather Be Reading, which spotlights the best current nonfiction books hitting the market and interviews the authors of them. Rachel frequently appears as a media commentator, and she or her work has appeared on outlets like NBC’s Today Show, ABC’s Good Morning America, CNN, and more.